Japan Business Federation(日本経済団体連合会,Nippon Keizai-dantai Rengōkai?) is an economic organization founded in May 2002 by amalgamation of Keidanren (Japan Federation of Economic Organizations, established 1946) and Nikkeiren (Japan Federation of Employers' Associations, established 1948), with Nikkeiren being absorbed into Keidanren.[1]

The federation is commonly referred to as "Keidanren", its 1,601 members consist of 1,281 companies, 129 industrial associations, and 47 regional economic organizations (as of June 15, 2010).[2]

According to the organization's official website, the mission of the Keidanren is to: accelerate growth of Japan's and world economy and to strengthen the corporations to create additional value to transform Japanese economy into one that is sustainable and driven by the private sector, by encouraging the idea of individuals and local communities.

The current chairman is Sadayuki Sakakibara of Toray Industries. He has been chairman of The Japan Business Federation since May 2014.

Keidanren and its predecessor bodies had a long history of providing substantial political donations to the Liberal Democratic Party. In the lead-up to the 2009 general election the Democratic Party of Japan made a pledge to ban political donations from companies and organizations. After the DPJ victory in that election, Keidanren stopped making political donations.[3][4]

After the March 11th nuclear disaster and subsequent shutdown of all the nuclear plants in Japan, Keidanren called for their restart.[6] This view was not shared by all business leaders, with Rakuten president Hiroshi Mikitani leaving the federation partly over this issue. Masayoshi Son of Softbank publicly objected to the focus on restarting the nuclear plants, but didn't leave the federation over it.[7]

Yahoo! Japan was a founding member of Rakuten CEO Hiroshi Mikitani's Japan e-business association in February 2010, but after Rakuten withdrew from Keidanren in June 2011 and made moves to become the Japan Association of New Economy as a rival to Keidanren, Yahoo! Japan withdrew from the e-business association in March 2012. It joined Keidanren in July 2012.[9]